


The Nightbook

by emmaliza



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: (because of delusions), (briefly) - Freeform, (but angry voyeurism?), (but not actual bestiality i just take sigils too seriously), Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Arranged Marriage, Bad Sex, Body Horror, Breastfeeding, Character Death, Dancing, Delusions, Dragons, Egg Laying, F/M, Family Dynamics, Gender dynamics, Guilt, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Incest, Injury, Internalized Misogyny, Jealousy, Mental Health Issues, Miscarriage, Multi, Mythological Motifs, Natural Disasters, Out of Character, Outdoor Sex, Parent/Child Incest, Power Dynamics, Public Sex, Rape/Non-con Elements, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Resentment, Resurrection, Sexual Content, Starvation, Surreal, Symbolism, Uncle/Niece Incest, Violence, metaphorical bestiality, not least because of all the corpses?, suicidal idealation, the finnegans wake au no-one asked for, voyeurism-ish, which makes it hard to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-02
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-03-12 14:50:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 24
Words: 18,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13549626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmaliza/pseuds/emmaliza
Summary: the girl sat fat with child, amade of sex and tin, the red-soaked supper of any night filling her mouth and her belly, upon the floor upon the land where the great sea-god brought down his mighty weapon and cleaved the world in three. A godless dinner, a meal unpresipatrided, a line of three and her in the middle, unremarked and afraid, eating and hoping no peril would come of it.Dinner, among the greentree eternal unyielding when the winter comes, among the smooth stone banks of the river slipping out to sea, among the harvest plains to feed an army. Among the land of fairies, oaths made and forgotten, history fantastic. Among the land of gods, one and seven, her septon's candle melting into her skin. Among the land of dragons, kind, gentle dragons to save the maids and give them their lands, and then be destroyed by cruel, blundering knights. Among the land of war, always war, harvest burning, trees burning, stones burning, army burning. The cool blue river always red with blood. Silverfish drifting up to surface.





	1. XVII

**Author's Note:**

> so, who decided it was a good idea to take the fact we have a castle named Riverrun and write a fullblown Finnegans Wake au with it? This girl.
> 
> shout out to [theonsfavouritetoy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theonsfavouritetoy/pseuds/theonsfavouritetoy), who helped me out a lot with this <3

the girl sat fat with child, amade of sex and tin, the red-soaked supper of any night filling her mouth and her belly, upon the floor upon the land where the great sea-god brought down his mighty weapon and cleaved the world in three. A godless dinner, a meal unpresipatrided, a line of three and her in the middle, unremarked and afraid, eating and hoping no peril would come of it.

Dinner, among the greentree eternal unyielding when the winter comes, among the smooth stone banks of the river slipping out to sea, among the harvest plains to feed an army. Among the land of fairies, oaths made and forgotten, history fantastic. Among the land of gods, one and seven, her septon's candle melting into her skin. Among the land of dragons, kind, gentle dragons to save the maids and give them their lands, and then be destroyed by cruel, blundering knights. Among the land of war, always war, harvest burning, trees burning, stones burning, army burning. The cool blue river always red with blood. Silverfish drifting up to surface.

“Good food!” The purest voice over chicken sausage, cock in mouth and not one word of it, red with perfect happiness. A look over to her sister and the swell of the ocean, oaths made broken, split between her legs and split elsewhere–

The lands have never been hers, a misstep in a dance, the girl once and then the boy once, _no no Lysa, not now, wait your turn._ A turn untaken, a yank on allburnt hair and spinning helplessly, in the sky, falling, _don't be silly, you'll fly!_ Catelyn, of course that was Catelyn, her incurable need to do what she should, to be happy like that, _liar_ , mouth stuffed with cocakaine, _whore_.

Happy smile and ruffling the boy's hair, _not fair, not fair_ , thinks Lysa as she clutches her belly, evitable pain come for her, as it always comes in the end, the height of her useful month, but she holds on, she can't let go, _it's not her, not really._ She hen wrapped herself in sacred blue, blue of god and purity, _not her, not her, white stains so easily –_ but white cannot stain itself, the image of ladylike perfection, ready to birth heir after heir after heir, _not fair, not fair, not fair._

But dinner continues, their food not yet finished, what remains unburnt offered in pagan sacrifice to gods above, to them, and Lysa eats it all, _the babe, the babe needs it,_ but no matter how much she eats it's not enough to keep it well, she can feel him shrinking, wasting into nought but blood. She feels sick, but she won't stop eating. _It is mine. I am owed._

Camure and Edlyn ignore her, as they so often do, her baby brother grown to manhood as she desperately tries to fill her shrinking body, before she ceases to exist at all. But he is not hers, he is Cat's, her brothersonguineapig to practice being perfect upon, and once he's grown to manhood she'll probably take his right there on the kitchen table.

Alyssa cries, water fallen to meet the river beneath, forever. She cries for her babe and nought else. _Never, never, not fair_. She rises from table, not good enough to softly make her excuse before, _fly, they said I would fly_ , but she falls, slumped over her dinner and blood down her legs. Blood and water, forever, _forever, forever, you will cry forever._

Forever away, nobody cares, the land stained red from the river, lillies bloody and crops meated, the tide that swallows blood and spits it on the world. An ocean away, no-one plots vengeance for a family destroyed. _Fools,_ thinks Lysa and she clutches for drink, but the salt drains her mouth out. _Nothing, nothing, it is nothing._

Jelkins will come to clear their plates away soon, but she shall not look at him. She clutches her head. Cat and Edmure laugh together, merry and free. _Spoiled brats._ Everyone is always laughing at her, silly dumb Lysa, too stupid to even talk to a boy, and she will not allow it. _I am not bleeding,_ she thinks as her blue dress and blue cape are soaked, _never, no, he will live, my son will live forever._

Finn, again, bright green love blazing to save her from burntblue dress and bleachblue cape, naked and pure as a babe. Fairies come to take her under land and to the sky, and asking nothing in return.

She grabs for drink again, burns her throat enough to make it bleed, but it's water, it's life, and the laughter fades. _Stormsmith, did you think I was dead?_ And then it's time to flee, to find someone safe, and she walks, wet from mouth to cunt, stained river red.

 


	2. XVIII

A fish, when her asked, unwed went for he said no, and that be all. A wine undrunk, a life unlived. A tale stranger and more magic than any of ice and fire.

A fish, to whom the little tadpoles always swam, warm and rough as an old firelog. When the sun sets, a lap to curl up on, to play kitten, strong fingers in her ginger fur. “Hush, little one.” She grows bigger and bigger and smaller every day. “It will be alright.” Empty promises, of course. Promises he was never meant to keep. They don't seem so treasonous.

Whispers and rumours, of course, there always are. Of loves forbidden or forsaken. Or sheer stubborn pride. He has told her so many tales, but never that one, and she is greatful, his armour cloaking her voice. Songs, songs of romance and tragedy. She cannot sing but she loves to.

Lysa takes the sword from its sheath and spears the river with it, fish all ready to be her dinner. Who dare ask why she remains unclaimed?

Summer goes as the sun sets, she will be cold soon, but she is now warm, the warmth of childhood, memories that are hers and hers alone.

“ _Uncle_ ,” but of course, never, clawmarks on the other thigh, clawmarks on everything. The smile spreading wider, _and other things spreading, no doubt._

She no longer fits well, her lumpy, eggy body, ruined by romance and tragedy. Grown frog-like. _You are to be lady of a great house. These tantrums are beneath you._  She could be slim and good and mothering,  _and I am, an damn, I'm beggar than she is in any case._ She is the good daughter, there must be a good daughter.

But hands, those small soft hands that stitch sigils so well, that braid hair and tend feverbrow. Liar's hands. Their uncle sighs in contentment.  _Liar,_ shouts Lysa with her cordial stare, but nobody listens, who has ever listened to Lysa?

But hands, those small soft hands that stitch sigils so well, that braid hair and tend feverbrow. Liar's hands. Grasping, silent, I's a beautiful hands, come again, beneath blankfish sigil their uncle sighs in contentment. _Liar,_ shouts Lysa with her cordial stare, but nobody listens, who has ever listened to Lysa? Better babble on, to sell well-priced. Never tell true and near be known.

The feast, they all have to sit for the feast tonight, Cat's feast. _Cat's, Cat's, always Cat's._ Tonight her fathers shall gloat for all to hear how good and pure and untouched their daughter is, the pearl of the Riverlands, her hands all over them, clawmarks on everything, claimed.

_But not him. He will belong to me, in again._

Finnegone, coolheart, but back again, someday, a promise – unmaid, a promise. Love and future, redemption. Family, honour, and the other one.

Lord Redwyne, he is, unmatched but still marked by it, unable to make his way out of the river. _Fish never fly._ A fish and his chicken, she thinks with a laugh, and the cat will eat him up, she eats everything up, her ginger fur and sharp claws, greedy mouth, grown to it but still kitten-like eyes. Lord Redwyne ensnared by the fair Tully maid's beauty. _I am made,_ made-up and made flesh, swollensick, but real and good, _I would only ever for love._ Greedy hands that grab them all, no-one else shall see tonight, beneath the feast table while the wolf claims his felix, but she see, she never forgot, green fae still in her, belly to bring him back again, to veer her way out, flying fish up the river unstitched, twin sent north. _No, not a twin._

Sweetmouth takes only a sample, leaves the rest to spoil, sea-foam on her chin. Gentle wipe of her lips and all is right again, uncle leans back in his chair, admiring mad onyx perfection. _I see you,_ blue eyes bright and wide, not so pretty as Catelyn's, but bigger, _I see you through._

Blue eyes, those same blue eyes, she can't escape them. Uncle. _No, not mine, Cat stole him too._ The trembles on his knee, she could fall, she is always falling. “I will stay,” _liar!_ He will leave her, he does not want her, no-one has ever wanted her. He has been sent away in grace – he will come back, he will always come back, he will be forgiven. Sword in hand, he has never begged, never cried, never bled his life away.

Upon the floor, she loathes him. _I should see him starve._ Lock the gates and siege the castle, leave him to rot into the river. He would sooner die than surrender, he has never been surrendered. She will leave him dydyeing, as he would leave her.

But tonight, feast, her body must return. Cat Lynn again, to look at sums and quietly make suggestions, perfect to make a lady of. They are so proud. But Lysa will beat her, somehow, her ruined body made pure and whole again. Jelkins, kind servant of mind, to dress and bathe her, made her her, queenish, see.

Away then, a room they gave her, the red fork beneath, but not hers. A fork to stab Is out.


	3. XIX

Cloth of silver, amade of treasure, the sheer great wrapping of an angel on earth, a world's present, a cloak upon her sparkling and swallowing, the sheer blackness of light apprehended.

“Lady,” Jelkins, the gold grin, warm hand of kind mind, violeye, indigone so like her own. Father's grip upon her aching blains, plades, servant of her soul, restorer of her flesh. Lightbringer, giver of green love and life. Trust, towering, statuesque.

Strip of choking wet underthings, a body fat and used, but free again, free at first. “Bathe,” in the rivers in the walls, and be made herself again, a maid of six and tin, twin, twine, ten, went herself again, belle reaved, riven, woken, a roar in a sungoing hour of the greatest month. “Bathe,” and wash away the stretch, the pain, kind touch of her naked flesh, Father's touch for a body sacred.

“Father,” she calls him, blood went saviour, they would be rid of him, Finn, again, but not here, one castle her own where he shall always have his rooms, Jean Roy chambers where she curls upon his lap.

“Daughter,” an answer, an embrace, silver circle shining back at her. “Lady. Princess. Queen.” _No, not I,_ trivialways forgotten, but through the looking glass a blue-eyed maid, pure rose unclaimed. Red hair, red foot, silvershoe and dress of sky. The long journey home. _No._ The warm grip on her shoulder, promise of love and legacy. _Yes, home in that, not here._ The innocent face insullisillysoluable, teats squashed flat beneath her dress, _but I am good, I am young, I am forever._ Face of starlight, collapsing, gnawing black hole beneath whitewedleadlouge, ready to close up. “Not you,” fatherlies, but not Father lies, promises unkept to keep her up. “Expanding, always. Forever.” Someday, they say, she will be everything.

“Dress.” Cloth of silver, grown of queens, born for her, wrapped around so tight like a samite skin, her belly bulging through the fabric. _Lords and princes and kings, I shall bear._ Long dangling sleeves to catch on her furniture, her jewellery, moonish eye by her window, watching. Plane of lace rippling beneath future tides. _No, the dress is mine. I earned it._ Amleth owned, omelette made.

Stays tightened around her fine new waist, but it's still to much, the breath yanked from her lungs and the cloth yanked apart, bare skin raw and ugly. She cries in pain, blood upon her legs. “Fine. Precious. Beautiful.” Lies, yet more lies, they cannot sew her back together. Cat was always the seamstress. Her long full skirts slashed open, armour melted away, and she weeps in terror, back again in the rivers drowning. Were she to drown, would they love her then? To wind flowers in her hair and lose her mind kindly?

Dress of silver, dress of sky, dress of _grey_ , of rain and rickety-tickety-tin, blood soaked into her sleeves, silt in across her neck, to choke the life from her, gashed open her pale white throat, bitten red and cold. Rain owed her halls, and the babe between her legs dead again, again, again, Finn, pounding, pounding, pounding, boomboomdoom, flesh taken, _not my flesh, no._ A cry and the pull of choke her, and bloody hands. _Forever, forever, you will weep forever._

“Please,” silly girl begs and sobs, again, for she cannot go like this, dressed in rags, cast off her betters, she is _always_ dressed in rags. Her body torn open and her neck bound, collared, claimed. _I cannot eat,_ the clutch around her throat. _Do they mean me to starve?_

“No tears, child.” A kindly voice, father's voice, fatherlillies, but. “You must go. You cannot let them keep you locked away.” Golden tooth glinting in moonlight, crueltooth, wolf howling in pain, _no, he is kind, he is the servant of my mind, and the wolf was never my flesh anyway._

She knows he is right: were she ever a lady she be a lady in rags, Cat would be a lady in rags, but - “Ruined,” she sobs, scratching at her dress, her skin, fierce ravens tearing crrips of cnoqk, leaving flesh grey and red, _dead, risen again –_ terror.

A hand beneath her jaw, kind art, made four of her. “You, sweet girl?” Sweet girl, she was and always shall be. “Never.”

Nodding, and the impossibly long march forward in her tin armour beneath a traitor's banner, _traitor, traitor,_ salt in her throat, sea in her lungs, worn down and burnt to ruin, ready to fall and smash her jailer's head in. Great grey shark comes through the river to eat the sea, shit the land and be the rivers, they have always been hers, made of firewater not flesh and blood, Ed's win when she soars above them. Dragon sewed in her stitches, rough and messy but keeping her whole, bloody hands and broken skin but she carries on, she carries her flesh, her family, her future, green boy who never loved the girl in her but will love the queen.

A centre, she misses halls away but makes a centre, sex and tin, a place to fight, but first to wait, waiting, always waiting. Terror, clutching round her throat, future come for all of them but _no, not I, I am good, I am young, I am forever._ An eye, cold and blue and naught like her own. Son and daughter holding either hand, no room left for her. _Holding what else?_ Hostish indifference to make a parasite of her. Anger in her breast, aching with spoiled milk. _Me, a parasite? I cannot even eat._

_My rags,_ she thinks, popish hear he will be angry, scream at her body, say she is no blood of his. But the set is collected and they can sit for the feast now, his pawn has come to him, not so ruined he has no use for her, he has ways that no-one will notice her any more than he does. Blood boiled into vapour. She would hate him less if she thought he cared.


	4. XX

Here's a month, strong son gone and knight fall, the dark mourning and moon across the sky, flying, flying. Time of sacrifice, cake baked and harvest reaped, rats come to gnaw their chicken, gulp their wine, manner loud obnoxious, holy woman long silenced, sipping water and not dying, not yet.

The age of rotting fruit, fermented, applauded, blinded by fertility gone to ruin, the stink of six up on the dais. Lysa wrinkles her nose. _Even at this she's perfect,_ her sister the made herself, fucked like a cemmenor, naked in silver thread, _but it shall unravel, all unravels in the end,_ and she sips her wine, syoolish and sure.

Her long red hair, woven through her teats, mermaid-like, arching back and look of rapture, reaching up for salvation. _No, no, not you, I am my lady, Hoare._ But applause, applause, so much it drives hear blind, _why clap her and strike me?_

Green light, shining in from the starless sky, her skin sick and grapes gone purple in her hand. _Vile eye._ And the wolf, monster, in his grey furs, his savage grin, storybook creature come to eat the fair maid up. _No, no maid, no more._ Blue eyes of sighs and moans, _not fair, not fair_. No sacrifice, no honey put out for eashy eating. Green eyes all around, gone for never, stone in her heart and the mewl of something drowning, _no, I shall fly, they promised._

Grinlit, potion drunk, deal made, she would find him, soothe him, claim him – _like the wolf,_ the roaring beast, his body like steel, her slut of sister writhing for it, her pulse quickens, _no, not I, above I fly, the love of a good boy,_ her heart was always made for love.

Envy, always envy, potion drunk and verting side to side, throat scarred from laughter, if only he could see, sword in hand and snow, snow falling on those pure thighs, _not fair, not fair, not fair._

The white of it hurts her eyes and the wolf he howls, in pain, grunegroin swallowed and she turns her head spinning, sickly, stomach bulging, _but I must, it is my only way, and he is nothing of me._ And in a second he were again, Cat sees no difference, the man atop her the same duty, _the same delight, they mean nothing to her, they mean everything to me._

“Well done,” Father, his pride and joy, her tears for love and duty – Lysa's tears, none scratched red down Catelyn's cheeks, only lust and honour, Lady Tully.

Again, again, her sister would never say, and yet it continues, her belly swelling 'til she would burst with harvest, and Father beams like the sun himself, airborne first all wanted, _not fair, not fair,_ the stink of sex and tin, _was there nothing left for me?_

Sessily, she peers her head across the floor, dances and singers, all she may dream of, _but you may not dream, not you girl, you have not earned such happiness._ Braven one moment, her heart searches for light, forever, mad green, growth green, gruesome mind cleaved into nothing found, said, known, cesilly girl, stonebroke dealmaid, smashed coalstuff, sourstuff, waterstuff, but remade and pure, pure, pure.

Red upon the floor, danced around ignored, forgotten, unknown, _it never happened,_ he says, _sweet babes, and trueborn._ Monster, bastard, misshapen lump, and she cries out greedyhanded, _mine, mine._ Drink in hand. _Father will see,_ but Father has never seen her, blind eye on first, and she stands, life trembling, still in rags, she wears never brave.

Small blood hand, _my blood, my boy,_ key, pour and whizz! Life. Sillysile godlike, death, bridged it, sainted, redeemed, sun in red and blue to take her in hand. Here's her month of glory, her harvest reaved. What mother, father, could claim her child's gratitude as completely as she should his?

“Mother,” young man, strong and bold, and red, so like her, strong and fair, all she dreamed he would be. Babe's cries, years ago months from now, she remembers. _He should have been mine,_ and so he is, ungreened, hers alone. His grin drowns out the moan of vice rewarded. _She should have given him to me. It was only fair._

And so he takes her hand and they dance, good boy who loves his mother so, ted he clutched to her breast, and he will never leave her, and she will make him all a man should be, not her whore of a sister, her fool of a brother, a true Tully, riverking haljair more than anything her father made.

She weeps her joy and lays her head upon her breast, thump of life she gave, hers, _boomboomdoom._ Music playing loud and loud, terrible, but naught to her, knot in heart, roped him to her stone, until a soft gasp. “Mother.”

Red upon her ear, deaf again, drowning, _no, no,_ to look up and stare in horror, deafened scream, needles on her flesh and piercing his pure heart, _no, not again,_ but he bleeds, hopeless, helpless, rain come to wash them away and laughter. Army around, death for coin, heck you bar reward, shisheilalelaghlaw, all rage, the tide coming up below, _heheheh,_ ally, her father's enemy, _no, no, my boy, come back!_ Blood, he were never anything but blood, bleeding down her legs, _traitor_ screams his wolfish eye, hacked up like an animal, and she would weep, she would beg for mercy, but from whom?

She-wolf howling, grief and pain, _stormsmith, mother's mercy, qretpqpark, perkot'q potfu, rkylbotalj goqyq, qannuqano, did you think she was dead?_

 


	5. XXI

Flea again, small and fed on blood, to be crushed, so go, deep in the caverns to to rot bow nash, current sucking her under. No, she will not die, near born more again, she must make her way back home. Halls dim and cold, there must be harth in them, must be, must be.

She has always hidden, borrowed deep in bowls of her castle, serflike, on burrowed thyme and merry celestial, map real, ta, toileing into the sky if only she could find the way up. Lock the doors and shut down blind, die in mind and live again, lightbrought homeherahere.

Night room, red flame cold, spluttering, dying, green wood smoking and no time for more before the roar of peternity, hide, beneath sheets, oakgrasp shaking, weeping, fool, _love, light, help,_ for here comes everybody and she is a loan.

“Slut!” _No, no, not I,_ songs and screams from the floor below, puriled, she loved, she lived, that's what maids in the songs do, “Fool!” Green rot beneath her fingernails, blood gone moulded, son bright spoiler, redeemer, stitched whole lumpen freakish creature, _no, not I._ “Traitor!”

Blood on her hands, blood on her legs, loons pay in tears and fissions, warboiled inside, immer squawks aprupting and she should scream, torn throat gaping, slashed and sold, _not I, not I, you, you!_

Hidden, still hidden, unspaced beforegotten, apoorro child maid of tin, and mama faulting, fading, for nought, nothing, ceccet impheired still, no proof, no life to live again, no pure cry _here's a sign!_ and so nothing earned, come of nothing, another dead boy, gamblinrewarded and gambled again.

All the way to pinch and fall, for a first mourn crying held, semi-precious, looning toward her cold light but warm for now, wrapped and bundled, but not enough, glassy eye and mama gone again, serfing, sun brought but still more blood until gone, gone, gone.

_Murderer,_ she should have said, made of six and nothing, tinechild unladieled into everyone's pots, not woman's fame fore woman's flesh be, to grow heads mired in riverbank thumb, green thumb for green eye, growing hearts hard as stone. She was not smart enough for that, _not fair, not fair_. Ever the smart one, Cat planned it all from the beginning, she must have.

A life of shadows, no lady, no son, stone in a blookchew living like a foot, squashed beneath sinister white and breathless, peaking high, sky sharp and grasping.

A polligan, _no, no, I won't!_ she screamed and cried, flat and choking, motherly hand upon hair, _shh, shh, don't be silly, you'll like him, he'll be like another brother to us._ She should have struck, she should have slain, cut that hole in the world and made space, already choking, and Cat would never understand, tall and proud, lady's mouth and whore's tits already growing at one and ten, Lysa never hated her at that moment, _I hate him, I'll always hate him!_

And she hated him 'til that day the light scattered across the blue shore, this sweet small youth made of rocks and hope, green eyes sparkling in their sun. Could this girlish boy be her devastator? No, and she loved him then, timid as she but standing tall and proud, he made her proud, and cast old eyes but no matter, he was hers, he would always be hers, he was all she had.

Her chambers wrecked in the furious storm and she cries beneath her bed, weak child once more, _no, not I, bronzed strong and mothermade,_ bleeding down her thighs but she would, she would make her life, such a clean body never seen, she must merely weather it all among her stars and her giant bird would fly to her, wrap her in his wings, as it all should be again, more.

Redwrecked choking, bleedlast words long forgot and neverknown, come again, _my child, where is my child?_ burning up, burning alive, and they lied to her, they never lied to her, they lied to her again, _it never happened, your husband will give you babes,_ she could have scratched his eyes out, nothing come of nothing, a sign it should be but he ruined her, smashed her egg for his breakfast and now he feasts on her suffering, salt to his floor, _forever, forever, I shall cry forever._

But the storm must pass, a cruel silence worse than words, and Jelkins comes to clean her room, to make her face, but not this moment, no. “You have disappointed me,” and how? How, if he never expected anything of her?

Open door and shouts from down below, a song of mead and meat, it must be, and she loathes them all for such glee. Crabs circling at his feet, fair beneath the sea, come to eat him up inside. She'll eat him up inside, a cramp in his belly.

_Thud!_ and she screams in pain, monster made in hearth and home, thick red clots between her legs, salt and snot from nose down, claws ready to snap in two. Left to rot, she always was, good for nothing no more, _but not I, no. I will make him pay first._

 


	6. XXII

Nightfall, locked away, silent as a sistermaids are. When the new moon comes she will bleed upon her sheets and never speak of it, godunwound baloony popped, but no noise, no cry, simple girl of yawn beneath the sheets, dreaming of her husband and all his sweet babes, as made do.

But no sleep, never, skin teangling her wake, earl in cold hand gone on, finch lush oh burging, clatter of voice burst open and cries for the dead made, how good, how kind, how pure, _lies, lies, lies_.

Wake comes after sleep, and old eyes weary, star out forever ago and reach up, past and future locked in blue prison, another light she can barely see.

Then a roar, a gasp as the world rocks to rubble, Lysa clinging to his window with her bloody hands, afraid, monster come to gobble her up like stories her septa used to say, great loathsome beast with fire in its soul, what can she do but cower and whimper, for she has never been brave.

But on monster's back, woman, goldensword violeye above the trembling flame, a witchich shone from great height, moon pouring through her, cold silver glow to swell the air. And then, some hint of a smile. "Go on."

_Traitor,_  they said, as his horse ridden east downriver, beating wing crawled over, clinging to the veins all full of blood. Oaths made to cruel men, and she struggles cross to harsh beauty wound in plaits, made sheersharrasheila, moonhigh, moonwife, and when he takes the silver woman's skin her hands are clean.

"Hold on," childlike, she clings, she must trust this woman, hard sword but warm blood beneath, to wrap around her back, to feel a grief like her own pulsing. Loveless, impossibly. "Now fly."

The monster, creature, liberator's roar as they soar the sky, warm against the autumn dying, to hold your breath and be free from west to east, south to north, head spinning and she giggles, sings, all a fool girl should do. "Further," impossible dream, and she should be embarrassed, her saviour firm and proper, ladylike, composed, iron. Brittle, cold, hard, painful, unloveable. Same fool, sour air, gasping for any scrap. Song capeting underneath, battle long since won, hearts and minds long since gone, never held. Lysa holds, silly little Lysa, no warrior in her, more like the music beneath but not played right, the wail of swordsong. Not good enough, either of them.

Seabound, above the trembling peak of future homes, piercing the sky until it bleeds. But a dart, a lean from his woman and her monster, and she is free, saltish lungs swallow the world. _Mother,_ she would cry, arms about flesh, lady refined, made better, the red drained from her. She winces. No, not drained, something else, a silver queen not white. A look over this woman's shoulder, and a small smile, a softness in her. Mummery, and Lysa feels blissfully childlike, grauzed beneath a borrowed name. Doubling folk upon the waves, great Trident to pierce her I out, they make her dizzy, but they cannot reach. Crabs yap helpless.

Land comes, and she gasps in the heat, sticky summer of sex and copperlocks glowing in the red moonson, a rickety tickety dive into the great city, towering a thousand years high, firing beast rushing among stone walls and casting a shadow to mount the world, they take it all, in her mind it is her own. There is a place for her here, land of books, land of past and future, not her green home of songs and cycles, the harvest ate and sown again, unceasing, unrelenting. She could be anything here, she could be the woman she clings to.

Earth boiling, skin ready to shatter, but no, this is the city that lasts forever. Mountains serge over the towers. Far below women in white walk the streets, they keep the shattered earth in partpieced whole, where are they going?

Screams beneath the glittering sky, vengeance promised from mouths raw and filthy, _no, forever, the city shall last forever,_ and then the mountains burst their banks.

Lysa screams, soot in her eye blinded, choking coal from her lungs, but they surge north, far away. _We will live,_ she thinks, weeping for the future smothered, cry of the she bean pytbotob rkylbotalj round her head, but there must be a place in this great hot sky, must be, they said she would fly.

High up the arrows come, doubling folk must be, savages, raiders, traitors, she cannot see, sillysile, _Mother, help_. But the air is cold above liquid fire, steel freezing in her grasp, fingers going black and dead.

“They will never remember,” voice cold and gone, like the cry of a corpse, “anything warm, good, soft. They will never remember.”

_No, no, not I,_ thinks Lysa, and reaches for the woman, herself, her rival, strong where she is weak, wise where she is fooled, pure where she is soiled. Doublefuck in them both, unlovedable, turned monstrous.

Just then, the precipiercipiece in the beast's eye, the roar of the world ending as they plummet down, down, no room for them both atop the hannot's qoir. _Murderer,_ a thought of spite, bloodied hands and her dear sweet nephew, the king in the way down, the white hand on her useless breast and she falls, she falls forever.


	7. XXIII

The splash upon red earth, a scream into empty air and then nothing, none to hear, just the whimpering of a dying animal fore the vultures came to scavenge her flesh. Arm, broke. Leg, broke. Back, broke. Womb, broke. Heart, broke. _Sweet babes, and trueborn._ The son drying her out, skin shrivelling, cityset hair bleached as the season dies, her final month before the long white winter, and may she die with it, buried beneath foreign sands and long forgotten, another corpse upon the towering mountain?

A peel of laughter not her own, as the skin rots from her bones, somewhere deep in water-logged lungs. _Useful creature._ Mindless, hopeless, helpless, cut for her pelt and babies, and her scraps left out to rot into the earth, a black stain where once was life.

Eyes closing, blue as the summer sky, lost in a cold grey night. _Let it be,_ the voice of a hysterian, the playwright tells her her part is finished. None shall ever write her name, her tale no more than a jest told finnegan, an infernity of gigglefores, an abaer's rino. But better to be forgotten than–

Footsteps shifting sandstuff, waterstuff, sourstuff, life parting as he makes his way to her, moseing with great noise on this silent plain, her little whimpers pitiful in comparision, but he comes to her, as he always has. Kneeling by her side, gon Roy's cloak ein, warm hand upon her brow. Touching healander. “Dear girl,” made worthy, laced with ruby sapphire, gem lifelessly beautiful, “how did you get here?”

A sob beneath the dying sky. “I ran,” fool that she is, but he smiles at her, yellow teeth staining as he kisses her hair. _Fatherly,_ she thinks, not shivering at his foul breath.

“Brave girl,” he tells her, and she screams as he collects the pieces of her, her limbs crossed open, but he is holding her together. She trusts him, herself, no else, or end again, but nothing whispers of her oath, the god she made it to, her whitebrightlight reaching out to her from behind the dying moon. She weeps her terror, confusion, loss. She is afrayed, she is always afrayed. “Shh, sweetling,” Jelkins kindly voice, slilver violent, she should fear him, but how can she when he is so kind? “I shall take you home.”

_What home?_ she shall always wonder, but they step across the water and the doubling folk keep away. He would turn them to steam in they tried. He shall make a place for her, again. Just for her.

Through the sea and over the river, deep in the green earth already dying for the winter. The city shrinks a way away, lost in a land cleaved in three, and her heart pulses. “Maester,” she gasps with a reason long since lost to her, locked in her castle with barefoot swelling, chains not iron gold or city steel, just rickety-tickety-tin, strong enough for such a weak girl. Impure, impractical, eternities locked away behind great walls. She would never be so brave in any case. “I need to–”

“Heal,” he tells her, and she remembers, a cup of warm green tea and a kindly look, her belly sore and sick, the scream as blood gashed out of her, the cruel promise that this was all normal. “Do not let them poison you.” _Never again,_ she vows, and they will put her back together, she will never let another man break her open. Finn, again, will come when she is whole.

Into stony woods, the black towers that own the mud beneath their feet. She almost sinks, almost buried alive, but he holds her high, and she laughs with her ruined lungs, almost flying. In, she cannot go, there is no place for her there, a castle she owns in her hearth. Instead, to a little cottage beneath the walls, ser-fish owned. “I am a lady,” she reminds, her silver gown in rags, redfoot burning. “I deserve more.”

Smile. “Heal,” a promise as he feeds her mead and cheese, her breasts and belly swelling, to make her plump and warm again. “Soon, it will be yours, the sky and waters, and all the earth between. You'll leave this place and own the world. But first you must heal.”

A lie, she thinks it is, he will never let her go. But she eats his bread and kisses his head and finds herself asleep in his bed. What can he do that has not been done to her before?

 


	8. O

Wake in site, the matered flush of a summer's night, slow and dizzy in a slumber's pace, heavy blue velvets of the drowning place. Choke and thrash, the nailskin cannot shout; choke and thrash, there is no way out.

Pulse, the pounding brand of meat not yet rotten, the with aching lung and broken jaw, trembling creature laid out upon the bed. Sheets hot and sweaty, red as a rose unplucked, great new terra sown and reaped, skirtstuff with rags and whimpering through her breakfast, afrayed, melting and think yourself broken, dying, sorebelly and think _what did I do to myself_ , dixy girl, for days pass and the gentle look, the concern, _dear Lysa, it happens to us all, I got mine last year, you should have told me_ and Lysa wanted to slap her, _why do you know so much about it then?_

Head above the sheets, breathe, one and then another, livid, then turn and see begetinning. The moans and slap of flesh on flesh of flesh conjurated, alchemical reection lewd and foul, no matter songs sung and scents burning, she wrinkles her nose and turns her head, but the sight never leaves her, evergreen overgrown, branches to choke the life out of her.

Ashes strewn across the sheets, yellow strands down to count, one, two, unceasing rhythm, over breasts high and proud, maidenly, but breaking down with every thrust, mothermaid warm and soft, begging to be reached for, to be touched, to have her teats suckled and her cheeks kissed, but she is so far away, shadow of sin enveloping, swallowing her hole.

Three, four, body swollen and seed planted, the cry of the supplicant lying back and floating atop the water below, stone skipped along the riverbank, body up, down, up, down, but not enough, not yet harvested, last wring of food out of winterfall.

Five, six, and the great scream finale as that great sword splits her open, steal her dead flesh apart, left to drown in firewater, sticky blue sheets come over like a wave. Lysa would weep, if she remembered. Father, with a look of regret, but not enough he would have done anything else. No more. Then, the bite, and the gasp of shock and joy and body blanched turned red, red, red with blood.

Seven, eight, nine, ten, elevem Lysa cannot count no more, tears in eyes, the moans and sighs of an ego upheld, red hair columbined. _Hoare,_ she thinks but it has never mattered, all that mattered was which one of them pleased him most, and what question is that, what man does not have a special place in his hearth for his firstborn?

Rise, away from the riverbed and to her own rooms; if she is alone, let her be alone, body fat and bones fused, stiff unnatural, but working, footstep forth to the door, to the black. Cheeks swollen, chipped monk, but no look glassways, just out, escape, into vast corridors that shall leave her lost and crying.

The great moon floods the hall, month of conquest, she must swim toward the handle glinting silverlight, a twinge of fear, but no, the room is hers, she will not shrink from it.

The room is dry, great fire roaring, ready to swallow – ashes spat out to her, words batted away, boitfir. But the bed, the bed is full, the moan and sigh and red hair upon the pillows, could so be her, but no, never, when has she been so fl?

Man unidentified, lost beneath red sheets, slave to that pure red cunt, as men always were, and an open rage burns bright, spitting from her swollen lips. “Horror act,” she says to her sister lost in pleasure, why she should spit and rage, _unearned, what did she give for it?_ The pursed lips and frown, little matron, older and wiser, no, no, Lysa shall not listen.

“What have I done that you speak to me so evilly?” Evil, no, not her, my ladied, but one sweet mistake, nought like the alley cat offered to every tom dick and, serviced senselessly beneath the sheets, mothermade not, no maid, no mother, no crone, no wise voice and motherly love, nothing, nothing, nothing.

“Two brothers,” men unknown, vague tie of words exchanged long outside each other's lives, “the great light of the sun itself,” the white curl and cool heart of the stranger, martian way and warwere under thumb, “and the monstrous dog, the beast, what makes you more a bitch to one, and not a goddess to another?”

The sigh of pity and the fire searing higher, would that it would swallow the whole room, would that it turned her sister to nought but ash and memory, would that she'd forget, would that could never dream of that kindly jaw and cheek, as she never dreams of her mother. The smell of burning columbines, _good, good,_ Lysa tells herself, but the smell gets in her hair. She would not want Catelyn to grasp the stone, to take what she wants from her one and for all, to make her never good enough, but it is not fair, the red tendrils wound around his soul. Lost in the flames the point: to sleep, to die, is that all?

"What will you do? Murder me?” The resigned whisper, and Lysa could slap her once more. _Why would you think that of me?_ And then, a tremble, tears of soot in her eye. Sister, a long way west, out these crumblings halls and somewhere in the current, memories not yet forgotten. Hands bloody, bronziron in hand, and the curtain pushed with all the weight of a ghost.

She stabs mindlessly, blindly, and yet no sound made, just a body in his thick northern leathers and look of good and honest falling by her burnt feet. Were upon the floor everything, life and happiness and love, and love. The fire gone out, and she whimpers in fear. Turn around and the red draining, Cat alone in bed and turning white, bleached to stone and made awful as she never was.

“Run,” the great mercy of the dying, and Lysa, Lysa runs.

 


	9. I

Climb, the winding corridor ever narrower as her body swells, the barren air that hurts her lungs, the black rock scratched beneath her fingernails that would tear her skin apart, but if she is old and weary she must still go up, up, no-one can catch her in the sky, they promised someday she would fly.

Towardling top and sigh the ice air, breast stabbed sour and skydress ragged, clouds floating away, ready to drown her in the evapor, but it is night now, black as blue and the sun can't tick at her in the gulfing dark. Freezing in her ivorish cloth, but none shall find her here, the I3 barely scratched a name, uncleftish quarks so high she may drift apart, torn as a tablecloth and solved to dust and stars.

_Empty_ , a thought upon the infinity of floor, strapped for the great fall, the everswaying sick and fat and mad, arms wrapped for some hint of warmth stolen like a summer dress when she swam in the river. _They mean me to starve here,_ the castle frozen in winter, the conquering season, no crumb of water drop of bread, her ice palace locked sonless, a forever of nothing, left gaunt and hollow before a hearth never burning, coughing up soot. A disgrace now expunged, confessed and repented, now to be forgotten til it disappears.

Would they any pity a knife, a viper, one last great act of rage and beauty, rebirthing self in a beautiful corpse, lillies in her hair, and armies charging underneath, the great dishonour exposed, explained, and the world before man and after crash and swallow her whole. A shudder. Steel raised snakely green and kings cut apart, resown; they tell such tales, but not of her.

Only an eternity of emptiness, the flesh melting from her bones, cheeks to cut her face open white hair flaking as snow, the mocking bloat of nothing come of nothing, the nothing that will never come, one useless body youse destroyed, turning to rock and ashes, swelling, would that she could swallow the world. Fingerbones out the tightening window, ready to chop her wrist off, reaching out for lightning and ready to send fire down to rich earth.

Water on her skin unrotted, a burning brand on its journey to the mountain, the sea, the rivers, ready to feed the masses with her blood. Then a clatter, and the gasp of a craven made. Turn, and a table, cheap wood of salvation and plates of flesh and water, fish and bread and rickety-tickety-tin, the scurry of her body pest-like, but not dead, not yet.

Chomping on the eyes and fins, mermade hole filling, filling, not yet filled, the infinite feast til her hollow body swells. Throat red, eyes red, but nothing before a body is her own again, a body sad and old but not broken, not so fully, a redemption earned and creation spun of her air and sin, a forever of her body, a pride unmarked, and if she only stuffs enough, wheat and ghoti, enough blood down her throat and the soil must grow again, she knows it must.

But the more she grows the greater hollow in her flesh, made ugly, monstrous, an empty room that cringes to look upon her, ready to gobble her up, but she must not stop eating, or she will shrink to nothing, her hunger neer satisfied her pain neer abated, until she is enormous, a shipwreck or the kraken who wrecked it, the blood run from the Wall to Dorne, too thin, and she is collapsing in her tiny heir. _If I die now, I never lived at all_ , and yet she slips into black as the sky, spoon in her hand, stone in a hideous grin.

 


	10. II

Stirred in dark, a cry in the nightgale, harsh wind thrust through walls and into her I, the vague awareness of life lived once more, timid end the dead rise from, again, and she brushes the hair from her eyes, old and worn and fat, but whole, total.

In her arm, a great warmth, and she looks down to see a creation, tiny and white, unhealthy looking, but there, her flesh made real in the empty sky. _They gave him back to me,_ she wants to weep, clutching the babe to her sagging breasts. _They gave me my son._ He is small and cold and quiet, but no, he cannot be, she will not allow it, he is perfect, he must be, else what did she wait for all these years?

Her stomach gurgles still agonisingly barren, the ruins of a feast before her only making her ill. It is no matter, she has her boy now, and so she will live forever even if she starves here and now. Eat, yes, a babe must wish to eat. To have prayed so hard for motherhood no-one has taught her how to do it, but she must, tear away the grey rag unflinching at the cold on her skin, a teat proffered, a sacrifice, but it is her choice now, priestly clad and hands round the knife (blood, her hands are still but blood).

The gentle suckle, weak and unsure, and so she clutches his head, drags him to her, for she is his mother, he must know that, he must never forget that, they will never make her nothing again. He looks so weak and small, and she would weep, _what have they done to him?_ But no, he shall grow as strong as one father and as quick as another, heroed with her hand about his ankle, she must only have faith, and make her sacrifices.

He will grow big, she tells herself, but even as his hair grows dark and his teeth graze her skin, he is still small, slot neatly in her arm, but it cannot be she holds too tight. Desperately, she squeezes her breast. Dark marks of the night sky, but no, none can mark her now, she has the title she chose. A drop more milk falls into his mouth, but it isn't enough, why isn't it enough? She can do this, she must do this. If she can't, then she truly is ruined.

The sun feeds from her breast and her belly aches, flat and drained; she should not, cannot, but she must eat, or starve, and she would let her boy eat her whole if she must, but she wants to live, she wants to journey down to earth beneath the sea, to show herself the holy beauty when her blessed gift byside, and she wants them all know they could never make her waste away. But she cannot if she never gets out. While her boy takes a pause, Lysa pinches the nipple with two fingers and brings the milk to her mouth, a cannibal horror sweet as silk.

She turns her head and! The babe again, bigger, braver, more her all redeye bluesky looking up for food. Swallow the lump in her: she can do it, she has flesh enough, milk enough, she is enough. She wanted him once, thought it was so unfair, that he should be given to Cat so easy, like everything. She wanted to kill him once, to punish them all, to destroy the babe they wanted like they destroyed the one they did not, but she tells herself as she lets him press his mouth to her right breast, she does not have that in her.

“Ow!” she cries as he starts to suck, hard and demanding, teeth as sharp as a warrior's sword and her babe would never do that to her. “You're hurting me!” It always hurt, watching him grow big and strong in his mother's arms and knowing she would never feel that pride (but she will, she will), counting down the days til they would take him north and she need never think on him again. But now he is here, grasping at her flesh like a monster, a man, and he will eat her whole if she lets him.

He is draining her, her skin wrinkling in a sonless age, and her boy is still soft and gentle, beautiful, but he does not grow big as this other boy, this interloper, swells against her chest, squashing the heir from her. “Stop!” she cries as she tries to push him from her flesh: he is not hers, he is _nothing_ , splitting again and again and again they don't need her, they want only to torment her, just like their mother they use for their pleasure and cast aside, but she won't allow it, his riverwide eyes like her own but she must be hard, brave, strong as she was when she raised the dragon banner, she must remember who she is. She must protect her own son, she does not have enough to share.

The cub cries childlike when he's broken aways but no, this changeling will not trick her, her boy needs her milk and when the beast's great jaw opens once more she grabs him by the throat. “No!”

And she squeezes, until his face turns blue, until his neck twists and snaps, until his skin splits open, a thousand red slits where the life falls out of him, and she keeps squeezing until he _bursts_ , a great explosion that covers the room in blood, it's in her heir, her Is, her mouth, and her legs. It is not her bleeding now, but she is still soaked through.

 _No,_ she gasps in horror and tastes steel (not bronze, copper and), _no, not I. I could never. I do not have that in me._ But the blood, not even a body just a terrible stain she can never wash out.

And at her breast, still, her son, suckling through the red on her skin, milk turning pink in his mouth.


	11. III

Corpses. That is what her tower is built from, why it groans and splutters, great white mountain claimed to crash and rubble in the air. She cry and close her eye, though it be no darker underneath, and her I turned inwards sees black and cold and dead flesh, ruins of a once great city.

Open, and before the table babe in hand, normal, ish, just the smell of iron broken across the room. But meat and bread, all the living need. Waterlife, herelittle, graskupkey again, more to make it grow, rot into soil and make pure again, my lady remaid, rewed, remothered, an open arm an open heart a blood red pulse shared from flesh to flesh.

Pour atop what remains, patch of red flesh, lump like an egg a promise, broke ofternot, and nothing. Dribbled onto floor, bile carbon burned right up and gone, a nothing they shall sing of a thousand years, when she is long forgotten, her skin white and blood burned away. _Who did this?_ to her red skin, red floor, redfoot, for it cannot be her. This great void, the coldblacksnowbound, teeth at her feet teeth at her breast, look down, and her child, she still has her child, she still lives while she holds him.

He suckles stronger now, _I had to, it was all for my son, Fir zeynb ylbotqrilb_ – but empty, the dull ache of flesh beneath, skin sickly white and feast caught in throat, chocking her with what she has not, yet, her sun not back in the sky, trapped in the cold moonlight of winter rocks, crashed in the unbreasted month, but she still lives, just a moment more, and if she lives than she can live again.

A candle, the wax cold and hollow, but a rock to side and she will light, she will burn and rise again from ash, red and dragonlight she can feel the heat now, a flintstruck girl and coo huel in brightest white, flickering green but the warmth is what she needs, head of this shuddering body her hands weak, a sip of uisce burning, but living, her lungs sooted black.

And as she's suckled, a swelling, a _whole_ , a befinning inside like should ant be, tiny creature, but growing, still growing, and her grown with it, would that she could step into the sky and squash this body with her foot.

But the moment does not last, the moments never last, one more just of cold wind and she cries, her light gone and bleeding moreagain, another drop in her sick red ocean, grasp for the candle but just smoke, grey and cruel, anothering her eye sold and a copper coin counted, one more for the pile.

Winter comes and comes and never leaves; she should serve it tea and cake, as proper Lady Tully would, but her feet ache, her throat tightens. _Perhaps I should stay,_ thought with no way down, _waste away like they told me. Good girl, do what you're told._

But a cry, weak and plaintive and eternal, the clutch at her white skin; she can't be dead yet. “Mama,” a word, he said it she knows and so she's still here, mirrorbright.

Wrapped in arms and up, all her warmth donated, her empty shell a cocoon, and out into that gaping void, brave as never. Home, never, no, but down, must be.


	12. IV

Outward, a swallowing dark of winter night, sky of a silver ring, chained about her finger and the paternity downward, her stomach churned as ocean waves, great flood to uproot a food whole and simple, unblighted, warmth in her arms and growing, reflected prismise of days aelien, deep in an unconquered moon. Dizzy, blinded, red green sucked out, a vague sketch was once a map, fingers in foreign blues and a way out, there must be. In the tales they used to tell her, the beautiful princess always leaves her tower in the end.

Crawl, childly, undignified, nothinglike. A frame upon a portrait hanged, a purpose, a man made right and good, no matter how. Rocks and branches, an earth to tear her skin apart but she shall bleed anyway, curled and warm and heroin, the rush of sacrifice in her vains. Impure, improper, but greatness in it, sin frozen in the winds, unrotted with each mold torn out of fitting in, as well as anyone.

Creaturish, this greak tret of warmsafesouth, but then a law obeyed, a law much truer than any of men, no man will emer harm her babe so, no man would ever love him so, night empty except the scurrying title down the red earth it owns, fingers of dirt and blood, the ruined creature they find at the foot of the mountain, and the step you found safe in her pouch.

Falling, slowly, caught brambly lest she smash to pieces, but she must move fast, the summer sun she comes, not to her, lest the eagle burst from blue skies and grasp her throat, saw her back into the clouds, eggsack swole and liver eaten out.

An air, a neverything, waterstuff sourstuff rickety-tickety-tin, oh sheen of silver moon come again in better months, must do, lightblessed hero, dear creature, need only get him down again, a world safe and good, made in green earth and the seed that grows there.

Wind, terrible wind and the young crying, clinging to her teat, eyes wet blindily but she keeps him safe, she keeps him warn, hers kin torn open a mouth of tears, bleeding, still bleeding, how can he not be safe if she's in such pain?

Monster, they shall say once she descends, mother, always, her wrecked bodysoulesile untaken, and something to give, a boy handsome and strong seedsee, whatever else, she did what they told her, in the end.

But the winterways, that horrible wind and a slip, trapped in berries grue great plant, and a swarm, wasps upon her flesh and a scream, turned red and hollow and nothing, they shall make anothing of her. Torn away, the sun screams across the world and _smash_! The dark eating again, like never was, one more joke of a babe from her broken body, used, useless.

The waterfall, her arms streak, she held so tight but it never matters, never enough, taste copper and touch tin, bleeding, forever bleeding, _forever, forever, you shall cry forever._ The one sliver of moonlug and blind again, wretched creature, collapse to nothing, black hole to eat the earth.

Fall, to the end of the earth, rush of dull pain with hours to go, a bad death. Rot to nothing grown from you.

“Girl.” A forever ago, seamen owned, land claimed and her, maid again, unladied, impure, a servant. Good for no else. “Up.” Enthralled, to a king of oceans and rivers, the same as all the rest.

 


	13. V

Undawned, winterstill, worked in the dark great tower of water, a foot white and soaked, serflike, ruined, owned. The unconquered moon's days dying, the world cleaved in three, the sea come in to sweep it away, bloody waters and burnt fields, harvest gone to waste.

Hands, old and weary, turning grey in the morning. Hellish task. When they are not they are, they arm, the land snatched and suckled dry, babes starving while the world feasts on their flesh.

Stone in her arms vast, aching, cutting her skin to bits, greater than her babes would ever be. Hod risen in the world but her left behind, up on broken toes to slide it into place, small creature, lost beneath a monument, a gift for some man, someone.

“Faster,” the creature behind her, a nothing, a boy, his terrible smile of fear and longing, Harren black and sewn with gold, neat perfect stitches too familiar, an act, a dance, but he will be her conqueror, he will own this land when it is torn to pieces, when there is no-one here to claim it. When the land's ripped open the sea will take it back again, and who tore again?

So scold the boy, sceney girl, and she would were she not her, here, where? Another tife, another lace, the great uncharted ocean of futures in which she could drown, she would drown, her eyes pollen-red but for now she lives, she works, and this squid has his tentacles round her, a terrible red ink soaking into her dress, copprish tang and promises. He whispers of vengeance in her ear, but from his grinning lips she only feels sick, and when she closes her eyes she hears women weeping beneath the roaring waves. These iron men, they always make women weep.

Look up, and he's just a boy again, awl ful of fear and hope, a buried wish, to be bluckened in the dawning son, to be claimed, owned, a name sewn in and kept for his own, to be high and dry when the tide sweeps in. And in the dreamscape, an impossible strange, drained, ugly, monsters drawn in the snow, fresh white pastures of a rotten state.

And a knowing, far away a terrible knowing, a foreigner amade of fear, to be replaced, to be forgotten. A hand on his shoulder to hold him back but too weak, brushed aside, the sickening weakness never shown, near-treasonous to show, never let them think so as little as they need you be. Lysa looks up, but she can see nothing, blind in the winter nights but those crashing cries of the sea. A horrible thing.

Look up and the rot's set in, a face white a smile got, the great red gashes of wounds eternal, the corpse come to bite her skin, and she recoils, girlish and frightened again, but there is no escape, how could she escape? This monstrous creature, ruined and crying out for mercia mercia mercia, but she has no mercy for traitors. The stones burning, no, stone does not burn, but she does, scorched inside from the castle turned to ash.

But a hero, dragonback and infinite, to turn this being before her into nothing. It shall rot into the earth, and none shall ever remember again. The lady of the castle, wife of this future unmade, she falls to her knees. Some would fear the monster and his man, but not her, his story, heroic and a fair maiden saved, the princess would never die in such a tale. Jelkinsenson, back to take care of her, and she can take care of him, a boy, good and pure and nothing to her, she could love him, she could own him, she could be better for once.

He looks down but his burnt black eyes, they don't recognise her, there is nothing between them, not to him at least. The hero, the black prince blackprince-made, trueborn wholemaking, a hole, a hole, and she reaches out for him, but the further she stretches the far away he gets. Eyesore, a pretty septon cut open and out came five kittenpups, and one more, the runt of the litter, why can't she touch him?

Those black eyes are kind, understanding not her so much, all around, and it is not fair, as she aches for him he should know her, he should tell her she did all well, but he never would, this honourable monster, she wants to tear him in two and he would expect no less. Cruel, cruel she wouldcould have been but he forgives her, he forgives her everything, and Lysa would scream for she can forgive her nothing, she _did_ nothing. All she ever did was love and try, in her life at least. Onyx stones shattered and madness melting. Why can't he hate her like she does?

He will do nothing for her, this conqueror, he will not make her queen of her own castle. He will not write the books and say she was well and good. She is nothing to him. The last orphan of the Riverlands, Lysa waits, she begs mercy, her father gone and mother. When Mother dies, there will be no mercy for anyone.

 


	14. VI

In the ruins, a prayer on her knees, and then the gentle tap to make her jump and fear what comes next for her. Spun round and the flash of violet in the black earth, a warmth flooding through her veins, fire among the ashes. “Jean,” she winds her arms about his neck, letting him pull her to her feet, fatherstrong, his grip tight and warm and burning her wounds clean, left a freshwreckwhole, risen from the red. This castle, blood and firesoaked, her blood, it belongs to her, and he can give it her, who else would, could? She grips his hand and tears spring to her eye. “I missed you.” Her jenbol halj, her qanxot dress stitched back together.

A smile, yellwing smile, a mysteriomise, for he shall look after her, he said as much. The father who loves the father who does not judge... She is pulled forward, “away,” and he will find a place for her, he must do.

Out into the wild again and she is frighten, a patchwork of scars, but they cannot rip her back open when he has put her back together. The land of trees and rivers, a little path into the heart, a realm lucked out, the flowers born on branches but it belongs to her, it must do, it is her turn.

And across the riverbed she sees a light, blinding brilliant, and she gasps for joy when she sees echoed in the water, finnagain, his smile sweet and sad and all she remembers.

Jelkins turned to smoke in her hair, in her eyes, and she leaps across the water wetfoot and into his lap, her arms thrown around him and she clutches, finds him slim and small beneath her flesh, no towering hero, no wolf in the night, a man none but her would ever love, a man hers and hers alone, he must be, what else does she have left?

“Deer one,” he calls her, fingers through her red hair and he loves her now, he has always loved her now, Jelkins was right and he rolls her onto her back, free as the dawn breaking behind the trees.

She laughs, hair of flowers and her gown soaked, as he slides between her legs animalish, out in the forests where none can catch them, none own them, the earth they own. He stabs deep and she cries: oh, the pain, but it is a tenderness, a sacrifice, it is how they taught her it should be. She loves him, and love is pain, she knows that.

Her love, her heart, her rock thrusts inside and he would never ache her truly. It is a sign, he has preserved himself as she remembers, found no other woman. She buries her whimpers and reaches for his mouth, the taste of salmon on his tongue. Her taste. He consumates her, til none would know where he stops and she begins, and she is free again, dear.

But her jaw burns, and when she breaks his kiss his skin grows fur, a nasty grey sheath she reaches out for and her hand tears open. His hair gone white his eyes gone grey, he is older now, but it is nothing, so is she, she thinks as she smells blood in the air. Blood from her hand, blood from her legs, maidensplit over the earth and he loves her now, so why is she still bleeding?

The ground is soaked, riverwaterred and her dress is stained, she is stained, copper in the air and bodies, her body weak and soiled, his body slim and strong, their bodies sewn together and there bodies strewn about, thousands of them, old and young and were and woe, the land cleaved and scars all through the earth.

Gasp in horror and his hand finds her jaw, a smile, sweet as cake to take away the sting of bitterty. “To me, sweetling,” but when he kisses she tastes lemon, and bones dig into her back. An terror rotten, the humans turned to earth one more, again, and what shall grow in the spring?

Above, a stranger, no he cannot be, he is the man she loves, he must be, would she do this for any other? His Is closed is better: know green, know grey, and forget, turn her head and trust, what ever should she trust otherwise?

But the fields, blown poppy red and the milk in her mouth, head spinning and blinded, til some horror vision, the wolf gored open and the stag with it's throat cut out. Her heart pounds. _No, not I,_ the fish and bird that never meet, what is she to this, this land the gods take and use as their own?

“Dear,” cool hands on her skin and as he holds her tight names spill in another woman's tongue, the stink of fir, the green grain gone someone else and burnt down, but the trees still standing, the dawn wintered out, and he boils inside her, her body burnt too.

Finished, she's smashed upon the rocks, and he removes, her sweet green love, such an important man, neat and complete. He kisses her brow, leaves another scar. “I will come back for you,” a promise, he promises easily, for he always comes back in the end, doesn't he?

He goes, fin again, and she lies, they made despoiled, where?

 


	15. VII

But the clock ticks on, the roar abroken over treetops, yellowblind into her eyes, and she would close and rot here into the earth but never no. Up, her body full of dirt and leaves, footfall to the forest, bark to tear her open but it is the world, no heaven above no ocean below, just soil stone and life, green and choking, forming that narrowest of paths: the only way out, there is no way out.

Her dress, in rags and her hearth, the fire ash and smoke and before long the rocks, cold and smooth and piled high, unburnt, her fingers upon the walls and she ends up back here, she always ends up back here. When was she anywhere else?

The gates swung open, huge, gaping jaw, ready to grind her back to dust, and the beautiful grin on the other side. “Lysa,” warm arms wrapped around her flesh and red hair long and soft, outshines her own, motherlike, of course, one of them was always motherlike. Lysa is repelled: this sweetness, this light, cloying as cake – all sugar, no fruit, no, no. “We were so worried.”

_Liar!_  she wants to shout, but she's sure no-one is listening, when is anyone ever listening? Would that she meets to shout and spit and loathe and rage. It is in her, a hole, dirt crumbled in so why, why carry on, her dress smooth her cheeks flushed, why  _live_ , why speak their qoftor reljyo like Lysa still knows the words?

“You were in pu teep last night,” a whisper in her ear, a girlish secret, of course. “Cirkot won't ask.' No, never, and Lysa would smash her pity to pieces – but she is frightened as ever, back again at the beginning.  _Of course, she knows how to be out all night,_  she thinks.

But forward gone, that trick ass and a girl follows, always following, the second copy with her ink all faded, into the halls torn apart light nought ever happened, a dream, Cat always told her she was a dreamer.

On the tables a great feast, and her stomach yearns but it scares her too, the juice dripped from sour fruit, a taste she will never get out. “Break your fast, sweet sister. You almost missed it.” Catelyn's always known her to love her food, and to never eat enough of it, afraid what will become of her. Lysa would strike her, to eat whatever she likes and grow only in her beauty, a harvest reap for riping. “You must be hungry.”

She is hungry, but what has that to do with anything? But across the table, a smile, and oh: those eyes, hue vert dancing when they see her, and in is him again, a truth behind the foulness of memory, a promise, the hand outstretched and the apple offered, and she bites in eagerly.

The taste, sharp as a knife through her tongue but that is how apples taste, yes? Her greem coloured live, she takes the seat across and lets her foot brush his cloth beneath, a proper touch not yet but it will come, of course.

It is but the three of them at meal yestermorrow, the five of them, the dogs come in to beg for scraps and Catelyn giggles as they eat from her fingers, coy as a maid, but how can she be, when she shines bright motherwight, a belly bulging with every mouthfull, grown only ever in beauty, of course, not fair, not fair.

A man in front a man behind, a warm mouth of sen and six upon the neck, a check never catched and a hand on the belly, a smile, a kindness, shy and soft but still growing, like the roots of a tree, til you would rip it up and all the world would tumble down above.

And her love, her dear love her stares and she should tell him,  _you were never anything to her, you couldn't be_  for that makes her better, that makes her smarter, to love not what she is told but what she found for herself, what others couldn't, to reach into another world and not gone leaf again, but he hurts, and she hurts with him, stone turned to nothing under the ocean current and why can she never stop it hurting?

He shakes, a spasm overtaken as the light streamed through their windows, green off the firs and the dogs not over, not yet. Lysa drops her fruit, but the juice clings and sticks, gaping in horror as Cat, lost in lust, and the walls shall come crumbling now, a moment before the last as he twists and swells,  _this was all her fault_ –

But then there is a terrible crash, and they all look up, unknowing what goes ahead.


	16. VIII

Up, away go on on, tea left on the breakfast bench, the school of them, treeforefuror swimming into the halls, the great place in its dawning, crowded hour, the men who come for food and justice, kneeling in prair.

They hide outside the door, her and her sister, for this is not their place, they can only peek at it, and Cat has always seen further than her, but they should be back at table, waiting for deicisions made. Edmure, Edmure could step in, but he clutches Catelyn's hand, afraid, small. Lysa stands alone.

And in the hall, a criminal, a face fuzzy and grim, while Father shouts and curses. “Criminal,” he spits, and her heart thuds as the word hits her skin. “Thief!”

Whispers, rumours, snarls of approval: they hate this man, caught in the net, they want him dead.

He looks up, a yellow flash in the great star before Father's head. Lysa hears the amethyst crunched beneath her feet and  _no!_

How could they? After all he's done? A thief? How can he be a thief when he gave them their all, he made them, he saved them from the grasping tides. How can you steal what is already yours?

_They mean to be rid of him,_  his knotted hair, his coloured teeth, he is an embarrassment, no matter what he's done, they could never be served by someone so ruined. They mean to be rid of him, and her too.

She reaches out but there is nothing, no hand soft and quick, nothing real. She looks around. Fin, her sweet green love, shipped away, so they can put her in chains and sell her at market. But he will come back for her, he always does. She just needs to get out.

In her empty palm, something grows, and away long last forgotten in the walls and in the air, a blinding light bursts from her skin.

There are screams and there is horror, and the green flame roars across the stones. She darts forth with her burnt souls, foot on boiling rock and she takes his hand, withered and old and owned, and her father stares but she breezily does not eye him, she turns and looks for an exit, shouts swallowing the noise of a boy crying, a woman laughing.

Jelkins clings to her like she has clung to him, familyish, and they find corridors, cold and small and winding in infinite circles, but they are hers, they are in her blood, and they will show her the way out.

Burning, she is burning, her skin pickling red and fizzing in the icy air, but she has to keep going, his pulse meeting her own and giving her strength; if she stops they will destroy them both.

Out, out, away, a body twisted and turned it in the dirt, the trees, looking round and breathing, her lungs sore and scratched, but she takes the air for herself no matter how it stings.

This was a village once, she realises as the land comes around. The stream still trickles, cool, kind and sweet where the maids once washed their clothes, where the babes once splashed and played, where men once took their lovers to the riverbanks. Ashes now, and bones, what comes again to the land when it is not the land.

A satisfying sickness swells in her.  _This is what they would have done to me,_  and so all is fair that ever was. If her sight blurs and she sees other towns, other wars, other worlds, well, should not a maiden cry for grief?

Jelkins smiles at her and cradles her jaw, fatherlike, like she'll never see him again. Her throat thickens in dread and guilt. But this around them, they didn't do that, did they? “What do I do?” she gasps, with the desperation of a final moment, and what the question is about is unclear at first but it is what it always is, the manmached shadow that stole her light. “What do I do about her?”

And he sighs, fondly, like she is a foolish girl again but he loves her for it, like they should always have loved her for it, and he pulls her close and kisses her brow. “Eat her.”

Lysa starts. She stares up at him, and he keeps smiling, knowing.  _He only wants what's best for me,_  but still, she could never, could she? Who would she be then?

He steps away, disappearing into the forests, an outlaw, a song.  _He will fin for me,_  she tells herself as she waves goodbye, and then it is over.

Turn, commodious circle, back to hosting cats, admiring what stands outside the gates, waiting maiden fair and perfect, like nought burnt at all, like Lysa's skin doesn't simmer and sear.

“He's gone then?” Cat asks, whorely innocent, and Lysa nods her tears.  _That's what you wanted, isn't it?_  A sigh. “Pity.” She looks up, and near faints in fright when she meets her sister's eyes, cold and red. “He was good, you know.”

Of course she would know; how could she know?


	17. IX

Afterwitch, the day goes on, as days airgone, the moon rised dutifully high and none shall speak of it, not even to punish her, her skin no burnt where would you brand her anyway? So Cat just grasp her hand and takes her to dancing lessons. Course, Cat always so loved at  _dancing_ , taught, celebrated, proper and pious and dutiful with her hands upon some man's hips.

But learn she must, Lysa must ever learn and never know, so into the hall, partners and instructors, the mummeries putting on their show and donning their costumes.

Easy, for Cat, to run to her wolf and be in him, as they should and will always be, his arms strong and fierce about her waist like no other man could ever touch her, what other man would dare, and he is not a cinder, not yet, unpitiable.

But Lysa, Lysa is lost, she is always lost in this grand empty hall desert of crowds they could bury her in, and her heart leaps up in her throat, her dress tattering over the floor. What should she do now?

A hand, a hand they found for hers, look up and see a face, golden beauty but bored, annoyed. Her heart sinks.  _Charity_ , she thinks, her father's made to bribe her love,  _he wants nothing of me._  She could claw his eyes out. But, that would not be what a maid should do, Cat never would, she should be good and make like she loves him, like he could ever love her.

Arm in arm they dance, and he is warm, he is soft, he is good, he must be. She would love him, if only she had the chance. But, a look over her shoulder, and Cat would never chance either. Above them sealyaway, green lock and gold key, hell in the world nothing to him, and she is nought to him but it is not her, not her, she was no worse than she was.

Once more, sillysile, spun round and clumsystep, dizzy, but no matter, need not impress, need not be dress. He will leave her, but he will leave her for nothing she knows, and she loves him for it.

But back against his skin, warriorbold and handsome, over her shoulder and a look. Glancing, fleeting, scalding. Cat doesn't notice, she never  _notices_ , but she is. An echo. Lysa smothers a sob. Drawn in, something fierce and brave, never shown in her, but grasped for, she'll ya heartbroke but still, a treasure sought, and the sand tossed aside.

A hoist, into the air and she feels sick, foot offground and really to fall, to splatter. Would that she could trust, but he has no thought of her, not even to look in her eye. His heart is far away. Up against the ladder and she clings to it but her hands are weak, girlish.

_Not eye,_  she think to the green ai in front,  _none done so wrong, not me, some like him, yes?_

Loverlike, he might pity her, but still seized and thrown down, skullbroke caught awake.

The splash upon red earth, a scream into empty air and then nothing, none to hear, just the whimpering of a dying animal fore the vultures came to scavenge her flesh. Come again, always, this broken heap weeping to the earth. Would the world would stop for her, but not even the dancing dones, spinning her dizzy eye.

There is no way out, there was never a way out. Not alone.  _He will come for me,_  a memory, because who else would? Smashed upon the floor, give over to the rock.


	18. X.

Danced off, left alone, butter hour smoothed slicked up, outside to the free to the world, the woulds were wore, cheapest frocks and dirty cheeks, trembling memory, the paw in her hand soft warm unscratching, and a terrible sickness in her belly, fine again, what once was wervera-off to the left, right, lost among the trees, great leaves to block the sun out.

But the boys again, the boy, green eyes shining, he missed them. Her heart thuds, adjusts, rewrites and they are a three, into the forest and no-one will touch them, no-one will know them, they will be this way forever.

They follow, her and in, ahead gone their devil goddess schoolmarm who knows the way, who has always known the way, who shall never stop in fright lost, falling away, and the great darkness beats overhead but seen nothing, above the trees, she need not.

By the rivers, these rivers that were theirs, but his, rocks in his pockets and staring into the water. Toss the stone into the water and it sinks. Naught, not wanted. Lysa's heart leaps in her throat.  _Just try again, do it different now,_  but he willnotneversame, afrayed, the sand on her fingers.

Cat, Cat too busy, nymfitting into the scene and they will paint her, her hair red her skin white, swallowed by the waters, her hair white her skin gone, no, not her, how could that be her, how could she ever be any less than she were?

Happylike, a scene sketched out and it once was, she remembers, the day soft and hazy and she could weep, for what, something long buried, deep in the forests and wouldn't they stay? Be good and right and pure, forever?

Thudding overhead, that terrible noise only she heard, her back broke split crash,  _not I, not I,_  cover your ear and it will never touch you, but none else hears starts, hen he way.

Rose up, bead in her mouth, gone way summoned, all done as she's told and Lysa watches, that disappearing body, made perfect in the cold air and she would cry,  _wait, come back! Don't leave!_  She wants her gone, allnever, but would would she do without her? A ghost, a vision, how any of them are without her?

Pray she would, maidenlike, but the doors long since shut and her green love, her rock, just sits, stares into the bush, unletgo and so there is no exit, just the thick tangle cross her neck, to cut her open and spill her blood downriver.

Shake her head and in the trees, laughter, joy, welcome and it is not fair, it were never fair, the sept next and she shall shudder, quake, terror all long and so when the wolves come, why should the cats be so happy? Either which way she hopes, she dreams, she loves. Why don't they tear her in two?

Turn away, but he can't, that stare to burn the trees down. It is his month, light piercing through and turn them all red, and she reaches. “Petyr,” a plea, a promise, and he barely even looks at her but she must through, else rot away. “Water, drink.” Her hands in the river and his lips sore, his throat gulping, she must do this for him, no else would, who else could give him what she would?

Hands sting, and pressed to his mouth weary, wary, but no, this is what he wants, the water, and she must give it him, it is all she has to give. Poured and down his throat, chin, chest, stained: but she will make it right in finn, again, once come round it will have been right always.

Stop, then all poured out, from his throat back into the river turned sick and red. Tears right open. “No,” a gasp, and scooping, desperate, she can make this work, she will make it work, what else can she do?

Pour, fill him up with her and he lets go, ill at the touch of her until her arms wake, fin, boiling up over side hellish, soaking through her and she can make it right, she can, but not before the flood swallows them up.

Water gone beneath her chin and peering cross the surface, sunlight sparkling, wincing, through the leaves Cat, always Cat, wrinkling her nose at the smell. Then beneath they go.


	19. XI.

Back she must go, good girl, claimed and labelled flooded to the door, the whitewoodor grand engraved swung open, into the halls, quite a drowned mouse hair plastered to her body, scented filth and shivering, wretched creature, washed up on the floor with nothing to her name.

Staggering girl into warm like, red, green, golden, arms around her frail body to be dried, to be healed, to be small and wrinkled in the son. In sense, cloying, sweet, choking, she dips her hands in it rubs the dirt cross her cheek, peprettified and look up to the sky, hidden behind windows.

Statue, Father, her heart thumping furious shame. But a way still, there must be, why else she sent her?

Passing overhead shadows, grand and great, her throat thickened in dress. Vague fingers shake the candle, wax sticky down her skin, and no matter how she scrapes not come off, damned spot, stained, stained, offered before gods. Close her eyes and sew herself together, pray,  _sweet babes, and trueborn,_  a promise, if only got it right. Clung to the altar, dry, sweet, belle reaved once they come for her but staying, none away. Were, were fuck wed she go?

A sudden blow, the beating wings pinned her still, great beast in the chapel where she prayed alone, her whimper, fingers stuck against the oak, nape caught in his bill and it comes to them all, a joy, a purpose, a frightened child holding on for dear life.

Terrible, the swooping falcon, his feathered glory lain above pushed down, face beneath the water, not yet drowned. Somewhere, strange heart beating through her breast, but not, never, this wicked bird lifts in air and locks away in nest.

A shudder in loins and left behind, flown off to much more important, this stupid girl, pumped full and left to it, a coin passed between hands, left hot and dirty. Tears in eye, tears in dress, and Father's savage smile, all worked out. Up to her feet her lips red and broken, she would spit in his eye, but them a scream, an echo off the sky when the eggs come again.

Ruined, awful things, not what shouldcould have been, they are all broken, they broke her, this red thing too big forced out her belly, so bold and strong and perfect, already smashed open, smashed so many weeping nights and yet coming back for her, why? Not hers, never hers, they told her.

Strange yellow another, awful, sinful thing, sharp edgeless,  _nothing to do with me,_  thought as he rolled toward, thankful, given gift none else could. Walls broke down, roofs green with flame and stag, a memorion midden, rotting away.

Hell in the third, so slim, dainty, perfect, sorrowed child to her worn out body wasted with what never had, too like her but better, and she wants to smash it, grind into dust so it never were either, never did a thing, but it would only come back, dead and rotting in the river but it keeps coming back.

And the last, smallest, weakest, cracked and  _it shall never hatch_ , but  _hers,_  known in it, and she'll keep it whole if it kills her, clinging, all that's good in it, hers alone. Arms round, others roll away as she falls, shatters on the floor.


	20. XII

Worn out, old, bloodied and damaged on the floor, the eggs laid and left now to fall away, duty fulfilled family forgotten, but no, the day goes on, her sick strange body up, trudged out the hall, bell ringing out for lessons.

She sighs at the bustling crowds who jostle and slam their elbows into her, not even noticing she's there, too busy gossiping about boys who never look at her, parties she doesn't get invited to. Lisa, awkward, shy Lisa hides behind her hair as she eventually forces her way through, approaching her locker as if she's just run a marathon.

Her locker is on the bottom and she has to kneel, her knees sore as an eighty-year-old's, uncomfortably ducking round a classmate a foot taller than her whose name she doesn't know just to get to her textbooks. The bells have stopped ringing and she needs to hurry up, else she'll be late, but she still stops and sighs at the picture she keeps blu-tacked to the inside.

The person above her laughs, because they all do, thinking she's pathetic for still being hung-up on a boy who never looked at her twice; the shy, nerdy kid who none of them liked anyway. She ignores it. She knows she's the only person still thinking about him after her switched schools mysteriously, but it is  _his_  month, bright sun of midsummer streaming through the dusty windows and Lisa clutches the secret moonstone necklace, a cunning breach of the school uniform policy, beneath her blouse. There is something wrong here, but she ignores it; he will come back, he must come back.

She grabs her books and almost closes her locker before she hears whispers and sees the crowd parting like the red sea, and she rolls her eyes. The popular girls have just come in, making everyone stare like something out of a bad teen movie, her sister – never in a rush but somehow never late – at the centre. Some boy comes sidling up to them, asking if Caitlin's going to be at the party next Friday, and Kate smiles and shakes her head, explaining she has to help their father at his store that night.

Lisa scowls; she's sure that's bullshit. Dad thinks Kate is so perfect, his pristine virginal Catholic daughter, always home at a good hour and reading Eddie stories before bed, and Lisa knows, she just knows, the second their backs are turned Kate is getting up to god-knows-what. Kate is so  _boring_ , after all, always doing her homework and reminding Lisa when hers is due, and Lisa knows, she just knows, she wouldn't be popular if she wasn't letting all the boys fuck her.

She turns to her locker again and stares at the thin white string, ominous and tempting and set up in her locker. She knows this is stupid, that it won't accomplish anything, that she'll just make everyone mad and Dad is going to kill her, but she needs to. She needs to bring Kate down a peg or two, just once.

Lisa pulls and hears screaming, the whole school breaking into chaos as the bucket comes tumbling down from the roof. Lisa clutches her moonstone again, and does not turn around before the smell of iron fills her lungs. She cringes. Pig's blood, they told her, and she asked no questions.

She turns round with a wicked smirk, expecting to see Kate standing there soaked red, humiliated, being laughed; not so fucking perfect for once, not so perfect they had to send Peter away just so he wouldn't bother her anymore. But in all the chaos, she can't see Kate at all. Everyone is screaming, crying, splattered with blood, and Lisa's stomach churns. The blood is spilling all over the floor, coming straight for her, soaking her pleated skirt and her white knee socks that, no matter how much bleach she uses, she can never get as white as Kate can.

Then the crowd thins out a bit, opening the windows to let the smell out, and when Lisa winces at the bright light she can see her sister. She's soaked in blood, yes, but she's not doing anything. She just lying there, out cold, tin bucket lying by her head, like a weapon. Lysa feels her stomach drop. “Cat?” she whispers into the pandemonium, as the world breaks down around them.

Her nerves break easy, and within seconds she's shoving people out of the way, crawling over to her big sister like she was just a baby, already desperate to catch up to her big sister. “Cat, Cat!” she cries out once she reaches Catelyn's broken body, trying to shake her awake. What is she doing? Is she just trying to make her feel bad? She can't actually be hurt, can she? Lisa can't have done that. She might have wanted to take Cat down a peg or two, but she wouldn't harm her own sister just because she was jealous Cat is so pretty and popular, would she?

She still expects Cat will wake up any moment, smile and hold her close and tell her it's all alright, there was nothing to worry about and Lisa will feel stupid for having been scared in the first place, but she tells herself she wouldn't mind this time, not so long as it meant Cat was okay.

But the more she shakes, the colder Cat gets, like stone. Eventually, a hand squeezes her shoulder and Lysa jumps.

She turns round and sees the school janitor, Mr. Jelkins everyone calls him, though she doesn't think that's his real name. He's always smiled when he's seen her in the corridors, and she's rather fond of him. “Please, my sister,” she begs, her voice shrill and hysterical. “She's hurt, I have to help – I have to–”

There's nothing you can do now,” he tells her, and she wants to scream at him, she wants to scream at him because he's right. Behind him stands Mr. Arryn, their creepy old history teacher with the bad teeth who's always giving her weird looks. Jelkins hand on her shoulder is warm, fatherly. “Come now girl. You're late for your test.”


	21. XIII.

_Westerosi history is a long process of groups of wildly differing values and experiences coming into contact, and somehow having to form the idea of a cohesive nation within themselves, frequently causing certain perspectives to be left out of the historical record. Westerosi women's history even more so. Historical documents are scattered with references to women whose actions were fundamental to the many conflicts and events that have shaped Westeros into the nation it is today, but for centuries, these women were treated as afterthoughts, or treated with contempt, by mainstream historians. One of these women, among the most prominent in the early post-conquest period, is Visenya Targaryen._

 

**This introduction takes to long to get to the subject of your essay. Consider rearranging the order in which you approach topics.**

**J.A**

 

_Visenya Targaryen, the eldest sister and wife of Aegon the Conqueror, has frequently been the target of charicature_

 

**caricature**

**J.A**

 

_and demonisation, much rooted in her status as an unashamed powerful female warrior, and the uneasiness this has stirred in many historians. However even many positive portrayals of Queen Visenya have frequently reduced her to little more than a symbol of women's authority, setting her up as the last remnant of the liberated society of Valyria, in contrast to an oppressive Westeros._

 

**Tie this back to your central thesis. The focus of the essay should be on a female figure's influence on the history of Westeros, not their roots in another culture.**

**J.A**

 

_Visenya has become one of the archetypical villains of Westerosi history, blamed for the mysterious death of her nephew Aenys I, and hence indirectly responsible for the cruelties of Maegor the Cruel._

 

**It is probably best to refer to monarchs either by epithet or by regnal number on first reference, not to mix and match between the two.**

**J.A**

 

_Writers seeking to demonise Visenya have typically placed her in contrast to her sister, and Aegon's other wife, Rhaenys, widely agreed to be the more beloved of the two wives, and the less effective warrior. Frequently the implication is that, if not for Rhaenys' mysterious demise, Visenya would never have had the power or authority to cause as much harm as she did._

 

**Can you cite examples of historians who've made this argument?**

**J.A**

 

_However, is this a fair way of viewing one of Westeros' first queens, a woman who was treated with great admiration and respect during her time? Certainly, there is no evidence that Aegon himself regarded her with contempt or suspicion, bestowing her with many positions of authority and respect, far in advance of what most Westerosi noblemen would delegate to their wives for centuries to come. Indeed, many have made the argument that while more records of Aegon's affection for Rhaenys are still extant, due to Rhaenys' patronage for the arts, the extent to which Visenya shared Aegon's authority is telling as to which of the two he considered his true queen._

 

**Who has made this argument? If it is you making this argument, say as much.**

**J.A**

 

_It is easy to view Visenya as being a victim of the fact she survived, not allowing her to be romanticised as the king's much-mourned beloved, and her record of accomplishments being overshadowed by the controversies of her son's reign, for which she has been appointed much of the blame. However, to what extent is it fair to hold Visenya responsible for any extent to which she did enable her son's crimes? Visenya was, by Valyrian tradition, always destined to marry her younger brother. One can only imagine her pain and humiliation when Aegon insisted on taking his preferred sister to wife as well._

 

**Be careful not to project emotions onto historical figures. You do not, and cannot know what these people actually felt.**

**J.A**

 

_Since that day, Visenya would have been left in a vulnerable position, knowing she was the less cherished of the two queens, and hence most likely to be discarded should any need arise. Should not Aegon himself hence be blamed for the rivalry that would inevitably arise between the two sisters?_

 

**'Inevitable' is a word one should be careful with. We can only know what did happen, not that it automatically would have under all circumstances. Also, didn't you just argue that just because we don't have the same records of Aegon's affection for Visenya, does not mean he held none? Check your arguments for consistency.**

**J.A**

 

_Visenya's culpability in Aenys' death has never been proved, despite centuries of assumptions. It is hard to fault her for being unable to prevent her son Maegor's abuses, when providing a male heir would have been her only guaranteed method to retain the power she had been granted in the society she now lived._

 

**Are you arguing that Visenya did not enable Maegor's reign, or that she failed to prevent it?**

**J.A**

 

_Visenya Targaryen married a man and had a son, and what more did everyone fucking expect of her?_


	22. XIV.

Lesson learnt the paper half-full the ink all smudged, her hand cheek stained hiding waterfails, crossed out in angry red but done now, the day half gone the prisoner released, up into the courtyard where sun blazes overhead, boiling her white skin. There is some to be done now, must be, but she none knot wot. Webbeshi, nothere?

Across, smart in shade, hiding, always hiding, and Lysa struts forth, no else to go, who else is there? Angrelieved into her sister's orbit, same as always, charrion back to the beginning, following after, tidelocked.

Up, those pure blue eyes, surprised: a memory, a family. “Sister,” Cat smiles, all forgot if known, so easy, so good, why was it like that for her?

Lysa would strike, but her hand stayed, the roaring best inside tamed: cold slate caged in. _He would not_ , a memory unmet, unreasoned, a hole in the world that never quite fit, why can't she slot that into place? Shaking, fall, standing, and she watches. Cat is Cat, safe and good in her golden frock, her golden month, and the rags grow grey as the sky, the torrents coming. Lysa, so thin, so cold, skin and bones girl, hollowed out, watching the gold belly poking through.

Humming, ravelling, and then un, a blink of surprise, and Lysa learns, lessens as the cloth come un, strings sewn, sown, sowed, but always doing, she must be doing, claws cut off and bleeding, staining her gowns but she never stops, she never stopped, she was always this, since Mother went, who else would? Lysa, Lysa couldn't.

Her sister shakes, her eyes glassy, tired, so tired, but she goes on, and on and on, making whole and hole unmade. A hand, reached out for her, but too late now, much to late. Nought but bones, and she would only rip the skin open.

A peace of cloth, Cat sighs, wrapped round bastet and those eggs, she left them in the lept but never, all she has in her, that's what they say. “Here,” Cat's voice, kind, soft, afraid, “hold on to them,” a trust, undoubted, a love and her, peneloped away–

_Smash!_

On the floor, the red soaking through, the words the drink the bedding vows, and a terrible cry, older and far away. Lysa gobsmacked, staring into her memories, what she watched a hundred times, and prayed and prayed to go somewhere else, but no, not really.

Looking up in horror, and then dropped to her knees, to beg, to sob, the father mother child crone, who else gave for but? The words, the words no write, “Fir, Fir, A'p qettu, A'p qettu, A babl'r poil re kytr uey. A babl'r poil ar, ilu ec ar. A'p qettu!” The tongue cut out, rkoat reljyo, smashed open, broke, sunk to the river, the sea, to Neptune's spear.

Reaching, desperate, but cold, froze, summersnapped and down now, the son fades from grace. Up, _love me, forgive me,_ a pinch of fury never gone, but when her hand gone out, nothing left. Roots twisted inside, clinging on to only cold, dead stone.

 


	23. XV.

It is always in the castle she winds up, riversunk mountainhigh, cold, grey, deadly, but a home, what other home is there? Halls all torn and tangled, fleeing down sulphur streets, tripping in her rags again but in the belly, away the wind the rain the earth, the world and the pain, would that she could it all but in, in, deeper in, sinking merged.

A door, grand oak reaching up to sky and old than she will ever be. Swing and breathe in the air, smoother, clearer, just a tinge of soot left. The room is bigger, grander than her, unnecessary, empty. Memories strewn across the desk, swords and sewing needles. A moan, horrible, dying, shaking her through.

_Monster,_  a thought on the face upon the bed, worn agrey and worms come for what the crabs won't. A smile, a reward, but then the gasping voice, the last rights: “Lysa–”

Waterfalls, immediate, instinctive,  _no, no, he doesn't deserve it,_  but he never could break her bad habits. “Lysa, please.” A power, what she wanted, would be pleased but she aches, she aches inside, why nothing makes her right again, who could say? She tried, she did try. “Give – for–”

Give? What has she to give? It's all long gone now: told, taught, she gave it all away, for love and honour and family ( _but duty,_  the quiet purr), always getting it wrong, always screwing it up but wanting to be good, loved, wanted. She wanted to be everything, and turned herself to nothing, cutting off pieces of herself and offering them up, the beasts whose throats they taught her to slit. Her body, her heart, her belly, she gave it all and they promised, they promised she'd get it all back, sweet and true. When they wanted her soul too, she gave, because he told her, born at the golden month the son so high: what given gave, she would never give it back.

And give, he gave gifts, gifted inside out, ruined in his name, wrecked all he made her for, so what has she to give him?

“Lysa.”

Rivers, the rivers run too long, she can never get away, the tide wrapped around her ankle. A name, another gift given every babe. A vow, a promise, one he broke a thousand times. Why couldn't she be enough then? Why should he want her now?

“Gods, forgive me.”

The light bounced off the walls, the mirrors shining, and a reflection, that face scraped away. Always a little more like, not marble-carved perfect, memoring too good to remember. The nose too long, the shoulder too broad, the spirit too unkind, the will too selfish, the lord too lawed. Echo, crying, pining, and forever. Give, give. None left to give. Not to one deserving.

The hole in him, the belly eaten out. Crabs, sunstone moonstroke, gobbling up but what then, what's left, to starve again in the end, for who would care to keep them fed? That learing eye, black and blue, bruised all over. The words cut out her throat. Hell in them both, trapped, the stinned and saining.

With nothing, out the door, the gasping cries and hide, run, as always. She never did change. Gods forgive, no god, at the bottom of the garden or high in the sky, just a girl, stupid, ugly, guilty.

Run again, trip again, and her palms red on the floor look to see the eggs, still, rolling just away. The one of them, so red and blue and perfect, her fury. Why won't it go  _away?_  Not even a crack. Grasping it, unchanged, and throw it against the wall. It does not help, in the end, but breaking things is what she does.

Smashed against the wall and there is a crack, a small one, poked through a finger – white, perfect, marble-carved. Lysa gawps in shock.  _No, it can't be, she's dead,_  and she grabs the egg tighter, slamming it against the wall once more.

The shell fall away in bits and pieces, but out comes the creature, red and white and pretty, so very pretty, everything she ever was. Everything she never was too, foolish, naïve, ready to be broken. But so sweet, sugarish, and Lysa tries to scream but she lost her voice long ago. Hell in porcelain skin, Lysa wants to smash this ghost to pieces. She wants to hold her close and  _fix_  her, may she never break like she did, but the first one long ago.

Thrown against the wall once more and she emerges, swan blanc and black and high in the sky, the stone smooth and warm and sorrowed beneath her feet, young and scared – she stares and she does not understand, she cannot understand, not yet – and Lysa screams again, voice swallowed in smoke, as the earth falls out beneath


	24. XVI

_It's a long way down_ , a thought staring into the ground somewhere, buried beneath cloud. Hands, bloody bruised, pressed to the sloping earth while she edged into oblivion. Where they all went, who knows, crimes for criminals, and the lady of the castle, doling out justice, vengeance, all that comes with pain.

Locked in her room awaiting sentence, the harlot, the traitor, the girl always trying her hardest, her best. Teatime, come again, the blood dried on her legs and sained. Out, out, eye from rest to veast but nothing. _No exit,_ they say, just the great wide wall and the world cut open, black teeth, black tongue, chew and swallow.

Fins cut off, little fishy not to swim. Made not to mer.

Sheillashattapon the rocks below, sorrollilly hanging on, but where else? Back and forth, back and forth, the lock and the leaving, between the moon and the earth, a fate, a feat, this great jump into nothing. A girl who tore the world down with her, but the world never noticed.

Would that she knew another way out. Would that the useful moon, circling back hosting cats, admiring the castle in the sky, the light bounced in her enough to light the way home. Would that she could write her chapter in the daybook, the light bounced off the page, a life authored on.

But none, an only one route, past Riverrun, a last alone loved

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it's finished! Congrats to anyone who understood literally anything; I will answer what questions I can.


End file.
